Single HPV vaccine dose may protect adequately

Women who receive only one dose of a human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine have readily detectable antibody levels that remain stable for four years, suggesting that one dose of the vaccine may be adequate to confer protection. Receiving one dose of HPV vaccine induced geometric mean titers (GMTs) to HPV serotypes 18 and 16 that were five times and nine times higher, respectively, than those seen in non-immunized seropositive women, Mahboobeh Safaeian, PhD, from the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md., and colleagues reported in Cancer Prevention Research. Receiving two doses in the three dose HPV vaccine schedule induced even greater GMTs — 14 to 24 times higher than GMTs in nonimmunized women, they added. “Our study is the first to show that even a single HPV 16/18 vaccine dose induces an antibody response that was readily detected in all vaccinated young women at the end of the 4-year follow-up, although the titers were...